Chapter 3 - The Ghost on Page Forty-TwoWithin twenty minutes, a second unmarked vehicle pulled up behind the patrol car. A tall, broad-shouldered man in a dark suit stepped out, flashing a gold badge to Officer Miller.
Detective Vance.
Division of Family and Child Exploitation, Westfield Police Department.
He didn't look like the kind of cop who bought into dramatic performances on front porches. His expression was weathered, analytical, and entirely unimpressed by my mother’s muffled screaming coming from inside the squad car.
“Which one is Savannah?” he asked, his deep voice cutting through the night air.
“I am,” I said, stepping forward from the shadow of the doorway with Aunt Helena right beside me.
Detective Vance walked up the steps, holding out a clear evidence bag containing the brown manila envelope and the original pages of my journal.
“Officer Miller briefed me on the drive over,” Vance said, his eyes scanning my face, taking in the worn-out clothes, the dark circles under my eyes, and the white-knuckled grip I still had on my backpack. “He said you told your high school guidance counselor, Ms. Alvarez, that you had copies of everything six days ago.”
“Yes,” I answered steadily. “I backed up every page to my school cloud drive, and I handed Ms. Alvarez a physical flash drive containing audio clips, photographs of the younger kids' rooms, and bank deposit slips I found in my mother’s desk drawer.”
Detective Vance’s eyebrows lifted a fraction of an inch. “Bank deposit slips? For a household living on state aid?”
“That’s just it,” I said, my voice dropping to a whisper. “We weren't living on state aid. Not entirely.”
I reached into my backpack, unzipped the front pocket, and pulled out a small, folded piece of thick cardstock—the one thing I hadn't put in the journal because I was too terrified to let even my mother know I had found it.
I handed it to the detective.
Vance unfolded it under the porch light. It was a private obstetrician’s appointment card from a high-end clinic across the state line in Maryland. But written across the back in bold, angry handwriting was a name and a set of instructions:
Arthur Sterling. Do not list father on birth certificate. Monthly wire transfer of $4,500 confirmed until adoption handover.
Detective Vance stared at the card for a long, silent moment. The color seemed to drain from his face, replacing his professional detachment with something that looked suspiciously like shock.
“Arthur Sterling?” Detective Vance muttered, looking up at me. “As in Arthur Sterling, the federal district judge running for the state senate?”
“I don’t know who he is,” I whispered. “All I know is that last month, a man in an expensive suit came to our house while the kids were at school, handed my mother an envelope of cash, and told her that the seventh baby had to disappear the second it was born—straight to an adoption broker he chose, no questions asked.”
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Detective Vance closed his eyes for a second, rubbing the bridge of his nose as if he had just been handed a grenade with the pin already pulled.
“My god,” Vance breathed. “Your mother didn’t just neglect you, Savannah. She was running a black-market adoption brokerage out of a public housing voucher.”
